American Governors and the Incarceration Epidemic
Public Deposited- Last Modified
- February 26, 2019
- Creator
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LaChapelle, Catherine R.
- Affiliation: College of Arts and Sciences, Department of Political Science
- Abstract
- Throughout the latter part of the twentieth century the United States of America has experienced an incredible boom in the rate of incarceration of its citizens. This increase arguably began in the 1960’s when the Nixon administration oversaw the beginning of the war on drugs in America. The U.S. now has one of the highest rates of incarceration amongst industrialized nations. The increase in incarceration has not impacted all groups of society equally. Citizens who have been incarcerated on drug charges have disproportionately been African American or other racial minorities, even though many studies have concluded that drug use is fairly equal amongst racial groups. In order to remedy this situation it is essential to first understand what causes and has caused rising incarceration rates. In this research I explore gubernatorial rhetoric as a potential explanation for the epidemic of mass incarceration in the United States. Using SAS® Enterprise Content Categorization, SAS® Text Miner, and SAS® Contextual Analysis I gathered data from the state of the state speeches of governors from all 50 states. I find that gubernatorial rhetoric that is tough on crime corresponds strongly and consistently to an increase in the incarceration rate in the states. The political phenomenon that I am trying to understand is how state government employees are affected by the tone that the chief executive of a state uses when discussing crime, and whether the actions of these state employees subsequently lead to higher rates of incarceration. The governor is the top government official in charge of employees of a state, so when this official addresses the state the employees may take the governor’s message as an order for how they should do their jobs. While many political factors may affect legislation and its enforcement, a governor has the ability to set the tone of a state when it comes to policy issues such as crime.
- Date of publication
- spring 2015
- Keyword
- DOI
- Resource type
- Rights statement
- In Copyright
- Note
- Funding: Honors Undergraduate Research Fund
- Advisor
- Unah, Isaac
- Degree
- Bachelor of Arts
- Honors level
- Honors
- Degree granting institution
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
- Extent
- 74 p.
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